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You would never have had to consider getting insurance if not for shrinking electronic gadgets. Next to your home and your vehicle, the laptop is probably the most valuable item you have and because of its portability, the risk of damage or loss is increasingly high. It isn’t just the financial investment that you’re aiming to protect. The thought of losing personal data and files makes anyone sick to the stomach.

Consider laptop insurance as you would your auto or home insurance. Is the cost of buying insurance worth it? Would the cost of your laptop justify how much you’re paying for insurance? On a personal note, you also have to ask yourself how accident-prone you are and if there’s high risk during your travels. Your current insurance policies might accept coverage of your laptop as an add-on so get facts about that as well.

There are many things to pay attention to when looking for a good insurance provider. Always give in to your impulse to ask, as there’s no standard insurance package. Choose one that has the best coverage and that is affordable as well. Read the fine print. What does the insurer consider to be peripherals and are these covered as well? Do they cover accidental damage? It is assumed that the laptop owner is a responsible user so if there’s any indication that negligence was involved, you might as well kiss your claim goodbye.

How are claims processed? Know beforehand what kind of proof they would be requiring. They might need the receipt or the serial number of your laptop so make sure that you have them tucked away. Check if they have service centers you can go to for repairs and most importantly, see if they give you a replacement laptop (with equivalent specs or higher) until it’s fixed. If the laptop isn’t functioning anymore or is lost, will they replace it or will they pay you the devalued marked price of the laptop?

Another point to consider is contract length. Most of the time, the coverage is a minimum of 1 year but they might have a package for you if you only want insurance to cover your one-month trip abroad.

Remember that insurance is restricted to the cost of replacing the hardware or software. You would need to have your own brand of insurance to prevent the loss of your work files or personal documents. Have a regular backup process and use security products to prevent viruses and worms from ransacking your valuable files.

Deciding whether to get laptop insurance is tricky. Take out your calculator and do the math. As I’ve said, read the terms of the insurance packages and evaluate whether the risk justifies the costs.

Related posts:

1. Protect Your Laptop from Thieves

Tags: laptop insurance

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 2nd, 2009 at 10:23 am and is filed under Other, and is tagged with laptop insurance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.